Dad turns 100 today

August 8, 2011 marks my father’s 100th birthday. (We often talk in these terms with celebrities—even if they are no longer living, we refer to them as if they were; e.g., it’s Beethoven’s 200th birthday or some such thing.) In dad’s case, May 14, 1970 marked the end of his life in the normal sense of the word, but in that other sense he’s now a full century old.

Since it’s been over 41 years since he died, I have to realize that Victor Elmer Lapakko has been gone for well over two-thirds of my life. In many ways, his passing seems like such an ancient, distant event; it’s almost as if he was never around. But, if I see a photo or two, or think about stories from the past, he becomes real again.

When it comes to dad, my dominant fantasy involves just showing him around the world of 2011. I think more than anything, he would have been fascinated by what’s happened in the way of technology. I’d love to demonstrate to him how computers work, or the Internet, or cell phones, or iPods; he'd be amazed by it all. One trait that he had was a sense of awe and wonder about the world, and I think there’s much that would dazzle him.

Dad would also be intrigued by what’s happened in politics. On the day he went into surgery--never to come out of it--he was as concerned as anything else about the Vietnam War. He wanted to know if the political pressure to end that war was going to succeed. He’d be surprised by the dissolution of the USSR and the end of the Cold War. And he, along with my mom, would be pleased as can be that a person of color was sitting in the Oval Office.

When you’re 19 years old, you think that your parents will live forever, and it’s still a shock that dad died at the age of 58. But even a full century after his birth he lives on for me, and I will always respect and appreciate the buoyant, committed, and curious person that he was.